Recently, I've been doing a lot of research, and I've found that there's a lot of interest brought up the suggestion from Shakyamuni Buddha that the whole of the holy life, that the entirety of the holy life is good friendship, admirable friendship, admirable companionship, good camaraderie. Rephrasing it in Mahayana language, one could say that the entirety of the Bodhisattva's lovely, holy life of perfect wisdom

[01:57]

is good friendship. Yesterday, I brought up the Buddha's teaching to his students. He says, students, one thing when developed and cultivated brings great fruit and great benefit. What is that one thing? Mindfulness of breathing. The person who said that also says that the entirety of the practice of the life of the one thing

[03:13]

is friendship. The Buddha's there being a friend, giving these teachings. So the teaching of the one thing is in the context of this friendship. And as I mentioned yesterday, then it would make sense that we would practice good friendship in our mindfulness of breathing. While we're practicing mindfulness of breathing, we're also cultivating and developing good friendship with the body and the breath and all beings. The thought arises, well, if one thing brings great benefit and great fruit,

[04:26]

why isn't the Buddhist practice just mindfulness of breathing? Mindfulness of breathing is the one thing, but without the friendship, the mindfulness of breathing will not come to fruit. And in the friendship, wherein the practice of mindfulness of breathing occurs, many other things happen. People talk to each other, for example. People mention the fruit. What is the fruit of mindfulness of breathing? It is perfect wisdom. So while being mindful of breathing, the good friendship brings up perfect wisdom.

[05:32]

The good friendship brings up being generous and careful. Good friendship brings up being patient and diligent and concentrated while being mindful of breathing. Mindfulness of breathing means that which brings the great fruit, and that which brings the great fruit is to practice mindfulness of breathing with generosity, with ethical discipline. In other words, the full practice of mindfulness of breathing involves all the other practices. They all come there. They all can be brought there. And they're brought there in the context of good friendship. Without this context, one might think,

[06:42]

well, I'll just go follow my breathing and that will bring great fruit. And I don't have to listen to teachings about the perfection of wisdom, or anything else, because that's the one thing. That would be a misunderstanding of the perfect wisdom. Mindfulness of breathing. It's mindfulness of breathing in the context of this friendship, which brings all kinds of teachings about how to be mindful of breathing, which maybe will be brought up and pointed out in the next few days, and maybe not, because there's so much to bring up. I don't remember the Buddha saying it in the early teachings, but later the Buddha can say,

[07:44]

one thing brings the bodhisattvas to perfect wisdom, the mind which doesn't abide in anything. So there too, mindfulness of breathing, mindfulness of breathing can have the fruit of the mind of no abode. And we've had a few discussions of a few stories of students and teachers interacting in a friendly way in order to promote mindfulness of breathing. As a matter of fact, in one story we saw the student approach the teacher who was sitting, practicing mindfulness of her breathing,

[08:48]

and then things went from there. There's a story which I've told many times, but even the people who have heard it many times may still not be able to recite it. So I'll say it again, until everybody remembers this story. I vow to tell all these stories over and over until everybody remembers them. I'm not bored saying it again. The story I want to tell is a story about somebody who seems very clear he was really devoted to the teachings of the perfection of wisdom. In particular, he was very devoted to the teachings of the Diamond Sutra of Perfect Wisdom.

[09:51]

He was a fierce student of Perfect Wisdom. People called him, because of his fierce study, intense study of the Diamond Sutra, they called him Diamond Joe. His name was Joe. They called him Giant Diamond Joe. But Diamond Joe, from the story, there's no mention of his friendship with anybody. Washington said no mention of friendship with anybody. But he didn't have a teacher. He didn't have that kind of forever warm and still-to-be-enjoyed friendship. So I'd like to talk to you about this person who tried to realize the Mind of No Abode without the proper context of friendship.

[11:01]

And how he found friendship. And in that friendship, his intense devotion to perfection, perfect wisdom, came to fruit. And after that, he became quite a friend. And from his friendship, his friendship was very fruitful. It produced two of the five schools of Zen. It came from the friendship which he finally entered and came to fruit in. And in order to understand the friendship that he entered and benefited from and carried on to the next generations, I thought it would be good to give some background on his friends to understand the friendly family he found.

[12:03]

So his direct teacher... What's the name? Did I tell you the person's name? The person who was devoted to the perfection of wisdom, but without friendship... Did I tell you his name? Diamond Joe, yeah, Diamond Joe. And Diamond Joe's Dharma name was Dashaan. Dashaan means virtue mountain. Diamond Joe was kind of a nickname, like Reb. Which is short for, you know what? Do you know what it's short for? It's short for wisdom. Why, thank you. It's short for rebel. And that's the nickname for Harold.

[13:09]

Because I was born in Mississippi. So Diamond Joe's Dharma name is Dashaan. And his teacher is named Lungtan Chongxin. Lungtan means dragon pond. Or another translation is dragon pool. Another translation is dragon marsh. Which one do you like best? Pool, marsh? Whoa! Anyway, take your choice. Dragon marsh, dragon swamp. Because we have kind of a swamp here. Dragon pond, pool, marsh, swamp. And the second part of his teacher's name is...

[14:10]

The Dharma name part of his teacher's name is Chongxin, which means respect, faith. And dragon pond is the name of the temple where he lived. And dragon pond's teacher is Tianhuang Dawu. And Tianhuang Dawu has a number of teachers. One of them being Master Ma. Another one being the national teacher... I'll just read it. National teacher... Kipin. And he had other teachers too.

[15:12]

But those are his three main teachers, all of which were noted all over China at that time. So he too is called Tianhuang, after the place he was the abbot. Tianhuang Monastery. And his Dharma name is Dawu. This person, from his story, sounds like he didn't have any problem going for good friendship. He left home at 14, after fasting for some time, to convince his parents of his sincerity.

[16:19]

And then he studied for quite a while, for about six or seven years, with a teacher named Mingzhao. And then he went to Guangzhou and had ordination at Bamboo Forest Temple. Then he studied with the national teacher Fa Qin. And later he studied with Great Master Matsu. And Master Matsu confirmed the quality of his understanding. And he stayed with Master Ma for two years. Then Dawu traveled to meet Shirtou,

[17:25]

who is, in our lineage, Sekito Gisen Daiyosho, the one who wrote Merging of Difference and Unity, which Suzuki Roshi lectured on in the summer of 1970 at Tassahara. And while Dawu was with Shirtou, his experiences there, in that friendship, caused his remaining doubts to be dispelled. Another version of the story is that when he was with Shirtou, the valid realizations he had with the previous teachers,

[18:36]

that mind of realization which was good, it dissolved. And then he entered into a more intimate relationship with realization. And this is the story of Shirtou, So who am I talking about? I'm talking about Dawu, who is known as Tianwang Dawu, or Tenno Dogo. It's the Japanese way of pronouncing the characters of his name.

[19:37]

So at one point in his relationship with Shirtou, he said to Shirtou, What method do you use to reveal liberating wisdom for people? And Shirtou said, There are no slaves here. What method do you use? There are no slaves here. From what do you seek liberation? And that's what Shirtou said. And Dawu said, How can it be understood? And Shirtou said, You're still carrying, you're still trying to grasp emptiness? And Dawu said,

[20:46]

From today, I won't do it again. You're still trying to grasp emptiness? From today, I won't do it again. And Shirtou says, I'd like to know when you come forth from this place. And Dawu said, I haven't come from this place. And Shirtou said, I already know where you come from. And Dawu said, Teacher, how can you slander people this way? And Shirtou said, Your body is revealed here and now. Dawu said,

[21:52]

Although this is true, although this is thus, how will your teaching be demonstrated to those who come later? Shirtou said, Please tell me who are those who come later. Hearing these words, Dawu entered into understanding. Great Enlightenment. Dissolving the mind he had attained from the words of his two previous teachers. So this seems to be an example of where he attained a wisdom with the previous teachers,

[22:56]

which we would call, which we could call, which I could call anyway, a wisdom preparatory to non-imagination. A valid understanding, but still some conceptual mediation in this correct, valid cognition. Still some image of the teaching. This interaction with Shirtou, this previous wisdom preparatory to non-imagination drops away and he enters non-imagination. And now he can come forth from non-imagination for the rest of his practice life. Which he does.

[24:01]

And he makes himself available to students who came to study under him and they say the students were pressed together, shoulder to shoulder. And his reputation even spread into the capital city. And then he came to this, his name is Dawu, and then he came to this place called Tianhuan, where there's a monastery. I get the feeling like possibly he camped out near the monastery because he was invited and he needed to come and be the abbot. But the monastery was in ruins from a fire and they thought if he would come and be the abbot that the monastery would perhaps be rebuilt and come into fluorescence. So he did.

[25:03]

And I don't have the proof of this, but he was said to live near the monastery, so I think he lived near it while they were rebuilding it. I say that because in the next story, which is about Dragon Pond, he was said to be living near the monastery. But these details are not too clear, partly because there's two disciples of Matsu who lived in the same area and their names sound similar. So it's not exactly clear how this all worked out. But I see in him working in spiritual friendship. He seemed to express in this story anyway that he understood the path to liberating wisdom was through friendship with good friends.

[26:07]

And he availed himself of great good friends and realized first the preparatory wisdom, the indirect realization, and then letting go of that entered into direct realization. And then he took his direct realization to the people. And then we come to the story of Lung Tan. And Lung Tan, I don't know his family name, but he had a family name. And his family's business was making cakes, rice cakes. Maybe wheat cakes, too. Anyway, he was in the family business

[27:08]

and he took the rice cakes that his family made and delivered them around the area near where Tian Huang, Da Wu, was living and teaching. And I get the impression that he brought cakes to the teacher as a gift, either from himself or from his family. And he would give the teacher a certain number of cakes and then the teacher would take one cake and hand it back to him and say, this is for your descendants. And I don't know how many times he did that, but after doing it quite a few times, this young man said to him,

[28:10]

I'm in the rice cake business. I have lots of rice cakes. I take them everywhere. Why do you give me a rice cake back? For my descendants, you know? And Tian Huang, Da Wu says, well, if you've got lots of rice cakes, what's the problem of me giving one back to you? I just, myself, just understood the story. Did you? Well, I've said it many times. Anyway, what's his name? We don't know his name yet. He has some kind of name. He hasn't received his Dharma name yet. He's the cake delivery man, cake delivery boy.

[29:15]

And when Da Wu said, you've got lots of cakes, what's the problem of me giving you one back for your descendants? He was a little smarter than me. He got it right away at an early age. I've had to tell that story several times before. I just got it. You can imagine what I got, right? Ah, delicious. So, the boy was deeply impressed. And so he went back to his family, the rice maker's family, and he said, I would like to resign from my job and go live with Da Wu. And I guess they supported him. So they went to Da Wu and Da Wu said, Welcome.

[30:17]

I guess I won't be getting any more cakes from you, but welcome. You can be my attendant and I'll teach you the essence of mind. Another translation is, I'll teach you the essential gate to the truth. So, the young man is now serving the great teacher, Da Wu. And at some point, Da Wu says, You seem to have great respect for Da Wu. Great respect for virtue and goodness.

[31:21]

And you seem to actually be open and have trust and faith in what I'm teaching you. So I give you now the Dharma name. Respect and Faith. Chong Hsin. So now he has the name Chong Hsin, which will later be connected to Dragon Pond, Lung Tang. So now Chong Hsin is studying with his teacher and his teacher is teaching him, but, and what's he teaching him? What's his teacher teaching him? Do you remember, Tyler? Yeah, his teacher is teaching him the essence of mind. The essential, and the essence of mind is the essential gate to truth. And the great teacher is teaching him that. However, Chong Hsin, although he respects goodness

[32:28]

and trusts his teacher, what his teacher says, after about a year he said, You said you're going to teach me the essence of mind, but you haven't taught me anything about the essence of mind. There's quite a few stories like that, of students complaining that the teachers aren't teaching anything. This is another one. And Da Wu said, Oh, well really, I've been teaching you for a long time, the essence of mind. And Chong Hsin says, Well, how so, teacher? I don't see it. He said, Well, when you bow to me, I return your bow. When I sit, You stand in attendance with me.

[33:31]

When you bring me tea, I receive it. This probably worked well. Let's check here to see. Yeah. And then at the end, Da Wu says, Where have I not given you instructions on the essence of mind? And Chong Hsin bowed his head for a long time. Let's say this was a long time ago. OK? And then Da Wu said, When you see it, just see it.

[34:43]

If you think about it, you'll miss it. Hearing these words, Chong Hsin realized that Da Wu had been teaching him the essence of mind all along. And then Chong Hsin said to Da Wu, Oh, there's a misprint. It says Dong Wu. I have to tell Andy Ferguson about that. Would you remind me, Kathy? Misprint in this wonderful book. So then Chong Hsin says to Da Wu, How can I uphold this? And Da Wu said, Live in an unfettered manner. In accord with circumstances, give yourself over to everyday mind.

[35:48]

For there is nothing sacred to be realized outside this. And I wrote in the book, parenthesis, friendship, close parenthesis. Perfect wisdom, the essence of mind, is nothing in addition to friendship. And we need friendship to realize that wisdom is nothing in addition to friendship. And what's friendship? Well, it's a lot of things. But in this case, it's like when somebody bows to you, you return the bow. When somebody gives you tea, you receive it.

[36:55]

When you give tea to somebody, they receive it. Friendship can be just like that. And to understand that wisdom is not anything in addition to that is the fruit of friendship. Friendship is inhaling and exhaling. And nothing in addition to it. But we need a lot of friendship from the Buddhism ancestors to trust inhaling and exhaling completely until we realize there's no freedom in addition to this friendship. This friendship is the entirety of the Buddha way. Perfect wisdom is to totally practice that

[38:02]

without looking for anything in addition. But great students like Chong Hsin, who have respect and faith and leave their family business to study with the teacher, think that what the teacher is teaching, that the friendship of the teacher, that there's another teaching in addition to this friendship. And then they have a conversation, this quite sophisticated conversation, which is also just friendship. But apparently they needed this conversation, this quite sophisticated conversation, in order for the young man to understand that giving the teacher tea and having the teacher receive it is the essence of mind.

[39:06]

That the essence of mind is nothing in addition to our daily life. So now we come to the next part of the story about the young man who thought that the perfection of wisdom was one thing and the Zen school was another. And he heard about the Zen school where they taught a special transmission outside the scriptures of the perfection of wisdom, which directly points to the essence of mind, which directly points to the essence of mind and realizes Buddhahood. He thought that was a heresy and he was going to go and refute this school,

[40:14]

this Zen school he heard about. He was going to destroy it by his erudition. So he headed from where he lived into the Zen-infested areas of China. And as he was traveling with all his notes on the Diamond Sutra on his back and the commentaries, he came upon a refreshment stand where an old woman was selling rice cakes. Many of us have heard this story for decades and decades and in the last few years I discovered that Long Tan was from a family of cake makers. So the thought occurred to me that this old woman

[41:14]

who was selling cakes in the mountains to travelers might be one of his sisters or cousins. And that he had his family stationed around the mountains so that as people approached the Zen land they would get sort of warmed up. So he comes upon this woman and he orders his lunch, his dim sum. She sells dim sum. And he orders the lunch and as she's preparing it for him she says, what's that on your back? And he said, these are commentaries on the Diamond Sutra which I use in my teaching of the Sutra. And she says, oh, I have a question for you and if you can answer the question I'll give you a free lunch. He says, okay.

[42:20]

She says, in the Diamond Sutra it says past mind cannot be grasped. Future mind cannot be grasped. Present mind cannot be grasped. Or if I could just rephrase, present mind has no abode. Future mind has no abode. Past mind has no abode. With what mind will you be refreshed? What mind will be refreshed by these cakes? And the great student Diamond Zhou cannot answer the question. And she says, well, you don't get a free lunch. You don't get any lunch at all. And she didn't say this. She didn't say this. But I say, she's saying, in her heart she's saying,

[43:22]

if you want to get lunch go visit my relative, Lung Tan. So she says, you might want to go see Lung Tan. He lives over that way. So he goes. And maybe on the way he says to people, where is Lung Tan? They say, oh, Lung Tan is over there. Oh, where is Lung Tan? Oh, Lung Tan. So by the time he gets to Lung Tan he's heard a lot about Lung Tan. May I comment that he met a friend in the mountain who was going to sell him some cakes and had a wonderful, loving interaction about the Diamond Sutra, which he couldn't answer. Now he's going to approach Lung Tan.

[44:23]

And maybe he wants to, I don't know what he wants to do, but anyway, he goes to Lung Tan. He goes to Dragon Pond. And when he arrives at Dragon Pond, Dragon Pond sees him coming and hides behind a folding screen. And then Dushan comes into the hall, one of the halls of Dragon Pond Monastery. And he enters and he said, I've long heard of Dragon Pond. But now that I've arrived, I don't see any dragon and I don't see any pond. And then Chong Shin Lung Tan steps out from behind the screen and said, thus you have arrived at Lung Tan.

[45:24]

And their friendship is ignited. And they spend time together into the night. I don't know what they were doing. Maybe Dushan was standing in attendance while Lung Tan was sitting. Just like Lung Tan used to stand with his teacher when his teacher was sitting. I don't know what they were doing, but it says he stood in attendance of this teacher. It doesn't say in friendship, but I say he stood in friendly attendance with the friendly teacher late into the night. And then the teacher said, it's getting late. You should go. So then Dushan pushes the door, raises the blinds,

[46:40]

looks out and says, it's dark out there. And Lung Tan lights a lantern and brings it to Dushan and hands it to him. And just as he hands it to him, he blows it out. And just as he blows it out, Dushan understands the perfection of wisdom. I add, through this friendship. And then he expresses his gratitude for this friendship. And Dragon Pon said, what did you see that you are now acting like this? And he said, I will never again doubt the teachers of this school.

[47:50]

I will never again doubt the teachers of this school who live all over China under the great sky. I will never again, that's what he said, I will never again doubt this friendship, which I didn't understand. I thought I could study the perfection of wisdom. I did study the perfection of wisdom. I thought I could understand it. But now with the help of your cousin or your sister and you, I understand. And now I understand. Thank you. And then he goes on in his career of expressing the perfection of wisdom in his very intense, friendly way, which he was well known for. One of his famous things was,

[48:52]

what he would say to people is, if you speak, you'll get 30 blows, and if you don't, you'll get 30 blows. This was the form of friendship he offered. I think Deshan thought that if he practiced mindfulness of breathing, he could understand the Buddha way without friendship. If he studied the perfection of wisdom, he could understand without friendship. Now he understood that this friendship, this relationship, it wasn't just that by this relationship you will understand. The relationship is the essence of mind.

[49:55]

So how can we take care of this relationship, this friendship? That's what we're doing here. We are taking care of our friendship with each other, and there is nothing in addition to it that is the perfection of wisdom. . . . Maybe that's enough. What do you think? That's enough. May our intention equally extend to everyone.

[51:05]

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